We Killed the Fish and the Vulture’s Feasted

Healthy. That’s always been the description of the pond on old Dogwood. Fish flopped in the water, turtle’s sunned on logs, bull frogs splashed and croaked, and water birds came to the shore for food. That all changed, seemingly overnight.

Yesterday we arrived at Dogwood on a spectacular and gorgeous morning with the beginnings of fall in the air. I got out of the truck to open the gate, expecting the freshness of the country when I inhaled. Instead, when I took a deep breath, instantly I got a faint scent of death on the breeze. As I walked up the drive and got even with pond, the smell was no longer faint, but down right strong and foul. A big black buzzard flew up from the pond shore into a tree. I noticed other buzzards in the trees. Not a good sign. I was fearful a cow had died in the pond.

After getting our stuff out of the truck and opening things up, I went back to pond to investigate. I saw a bunch of white things floating in the water. Relieved that it probably was not a dead cow, I was not prepared for the truth. Moving closer to pond’s edge I realized the white things were fish, lots of them and of all sizes. All of the fish were floating on their sides dead in the water. Dead catfish, perch and bass littered the shore and water. I didn’t realize there were that many fish in the little pond until that moment but they were floaters rather than swimmers.

We had little rain in the last month, the water level was low. What we believe, but have not yet confirmed, happened is that the low water level along with the nitrogen the cow’s manure caused an anoxic environment in the pond. Fish cannot live without adequate oxygen in the water so they died. We have an appointment in a few weeks with the county agricultural agent and the county biologist to help us determine how to improve our pasture grass, but now we will include how to fix the pond to the discussion.

We of course take full responsibility for this tragedy and smelly mess. However, I’m going to use the situation to get on my soapbox about the State of Texas’ supposed encouragement of landowners to use their property for wildlife activities. Property taxes on raw land can be high. However, Texas, like most states, offers incentives to landowners who engage in agricultural activities on the land. Such activities include raising crops for human or livestock consumption, growing cotton, raising livestock, keeping bees, maintaining a hay field and many other activities. In order to encourage agriculture in the state, land used for agriculture purposes qualifies for an agricultural tax valuation, or the so called “Ag Exemption.” This tax break can save the landowner 70% or more on property taxes. To establish the Ag Exemption, agricultural activities must occur for five consecutive years on the property. After five years, the property has established an agricultural history and receives the Ag Exemption. So long as an Ag activity continues on the property, the property is subject to the landowner-favorable Ag tax exemption.

Texas also recognizes a wildlife tax valuation for land, the so called “Wildlife Exemption” with the same tax savings as the Ag Exemption. But, here’s the problem. Unlike the Ag Exemption, a landowner cannot go from no exemption status straight to a Wildlife Exemption. The law only allows property that already has an Ag Exemption to convert to a Wildlife Exemption. So, a property with no exemption status must first spend five years establishing a agricultural history and obtain the Ag Exemption to be eligible to convert the Ag to a Wildlife Exemption.

Old Dogwood with the pond had no exemption when we bought it in 2003. Although we have engaged in qualifying wildlife activities on the land for seven years, because it does not have an Ag Exemption, we cannot obtain a Wildlife Exemption. For seven years we paid Washington County full freight on property taxes while our neighbors with much larger properties only paid a fraction of the tax we paid because they had Ag Exemptions. When we purchased the neighboring 40 acres last November, the property was transferred to us with an over 60-year agricultural history and an Ag Exemption. That is why we also purchased the sellers cattle herd, to maintain the Ag until we were able to convert to a Wildlife Exemption.

We realized that if we could now allow the cattle to graze on old Dogwood, in five years it would have an Ag Exemption and then we could convert the entire 50 acres to Wildlife. We understood the cattle would drop their manure on the place, stomp–up the shore around the pond and create a trail to the pond. Sure enough, they did all of that but we thought it a little price to pay for the future ability to convert the property to a Wildlife Exemption and significantly reduce our property tax bill.

The problem with the pond probably could have been avoided with proper management had we considered the addition of the cattle; nonetheless the idea that the State of Texas requires us to destroy or potentially damage the wildlife habits on the property before we are allowed to qualify for a Wildlife Exemption seems backwards-in other words, government-like. But that is the case. I am concerned the cows may be causing other damage that we haven’t noticed yet.

We hope the vultures and buzzards do their clean-up job during the week so that the fish and the bad smell are gone next weekend. All of these years we left the pond alone as it was alive and healthy. Now, from our own ignorance and failure to inquire with experts on what the cows would do to the pond without some sort of intervention from us, the pond is dead or close to it. We feel awful but, don’t worry; we will get proper advice on how to bring it back to life and how not to allow it happen again. It may be as simple as aeration of the water. We shall see and will report back.